Mass Effect: Corrosion
by TenDollarT
Summary: "No Man Knows My History" - Commander Shepard is a lie built atop a wish that entombs a scream; her past is a nightmare that bleeds relentlessly into her waking life. And still Christina Shepard has to survive to meet her destiny, defend a suicidally ambivalent galaxy, and maybe not punch Councilor Sparatus in the face. More than once.


_AN: Right, first chapter of the first fic. Let's see if I go the distance._

_Props to: Jeltor my merciless editor, Corentin IV for pre-reading and advice (and Sinchi -MOAR!), Gatac for giving me a standard to aspire to (best FFN writer you've never read), and The Allusive Man for Gods &amp; Monsters (a spectacular example of going incredibly dark and still keeping it Mass Effect), Wyles77 for his/her Better Angels epics, impressive grasp of terminology (_"the repple-depple"_), and panty-igniting Shep-Li romance (not just hot, but steamy) and anyone else I'm forgetting._

_Also, to keep the confusion down Christina Shepard is a) a Ruthless Survivor Sentinel and b) half-OC insofar as she's not necessarily going to keep to the original dialogue word-for-word. Get it? Got it? Good. Let's get this started._

Edit: FFN keeps eating my fucking formatting, so I'll just live with it. Apologies if that creates reading problems, and I won't be replacing this chapter again.

* * *

Commander Christina Shepard is awake again.

(_Again?_)

Death-terror crashes through her bleary awareness and she thrashes; gasping in panic with lungs straining to feed a dying mind, blackening thoughts strangling in-

Nothing.

Sterile environment, recycled air, plain medical table, (_clothing_), her face burning in pain -this isn't Alchera and she isn't screaming her way through her own viking funeral.

"Shepard! Get. UP!"

Up she gets.

A peculiar woman's voice is pointing out armor, a weapon, an omnitool -danger's nearby, she's got to be ready.

Among the alarms and soft popping echoes of distant small-caliber weapons fire two things stand out:

The first is that her instructor has an accent, which means she's from a specific ethnic enclave if not Earth itself,

And that among the short list of things she'd like to find in the afterlife -her family, a steak dinner (_with lemon and pepper baked fish, rich greens &amp;crutons, cheddar-mashed potatos with chives, a piece of sweet melon, a cold glass of water and maybe a double shot of vodka before dessert_), **Liara** (_but not dead oh no no no so a clone..?_)

-She chops short her mental wandering; she's hungry -she's always a little hungry (_yay biotics_), and makes herself focus on the thing that reminds her that not only is she not in an afterlife -which she refuses to believe in, but if she was it would more likely be a kind of hell because there is a Predator Heavy Pistol-

(_and her father, broad chest and grey cotton shirt flowered open by a shotgun hit, eyes glazed with the confused outrage of the suddenly dead, Barry's plastic Predator tiny in his large brown hand. Dead hands, dead home, varren fighting over half a body, Batarian skin is like shark skin, and Batarian teeth are like-_)

And through that she's mechanically stripping down and pulling on her pressure suit (_pre-fitted_), snapping on the omnitool (_sweet, a Savant_ -_pre-registered and pre-loaded with Bulwark Professional Edition revision 2, v1.85_ -she makes another note, "replace and update") and locking together her armor (_stock medium female Alliance hardshell -oorah Gunny Williams_), and the voice is prompting her to pick the pistol up-

Christina is instead thrusting her palm at it, feeling her spinal eezo nodules heat up with a flush of savage anger, watching the (_fucking useless piece of shit_) gun burst under a thousand Newtons of pressure.

"Shepard-"

"You. Shut _up_," she spits.

Mrs. Terra-clave is quiet.

For a few seconds.

"I'm updating your navsofts with a route out, Shepard."

And now there is a small glowing arrow, and more importantly for someone who (_hasn't locked her helmet on yet_) a command prompt patiently ticking away in the corner of her vision.

This is weird, but she's a Sentinel. She'll just...(_hack herself_).

She mentally squints at it _C:\\\hashfile:_

_C:__\ _

_C:\ _

_C:\ _

_C:\ _

_C:\ _

_C:\MarrowManager-_

_-stop._

There are hundreds of entries, and she's in an unknown live-fire location.

_C:\\\ShepStepv11.3\ReadMe!.wpd_

_"This program is the core kernal of the VI tasked with physical motor coordination-"_

-Christina skips ahead,

_...copyright M. Lawson, E. Wilson, all rights reserved 2185._

(**_2185_**!)

_Closeall._

An onboard dedicated medical VI.

She was in bad shape; she still might be-

And that means nothing right now.

She's a System Alliance Marine an, N7 rated gradudate of the ICT.

There is no way but forward -Marines don't die, they just fail to report for muster.

(_or get incinerated on Virmire_)

*bweeem* -holographic armor up.

"Right. Oscar-Mike, control."

The arrow blinks unobtrusively, and Christina Shepard moves out.

* * *

The station (_space, not terresterial; she feels the gravity microfluctuate as she moves_)is strewn with scorched bodies, blood-smeared walls, and berzerk security mechs.

To Sheperd it doesn't add up -no shields, no body armor, few weapons, and defensive wounds for those dead who weren't executed at point blank range.

These people weren't ready for combat on any level.

And to her the murdering mechs are a training exercise.

A babbling LOKI mech stutters as it unfolds itself, raises it's weapon to shoot.

Christina biotically _rips_ it's weapon out it's grip and across the floor, scoops it up, wipes the FoF metrics (Tali would've been impressed), racks the heatsink and blows it's fool head apart at arm's length.

A Shuriken machine pistol and, she flicks her gaze to her HUD as it synchs up, four and a half capacities.

Things are looking up.

She hustles around a corner, up the stairs, pushing on with her biotics snapping forward, Shuriken spitting left and right; as she lashes out what she doesn't smash or spray down gets overloaded and dies in bursts of sparks and screeching, chattering death-code.

More shattered mechs, more spare heatsinks to lock into chest and thigh slots -but no better weapons.

...and no greater insight into her situation.

Another dead non-com, and a weapon.

It's a grenade launcher ("_M-100 Grenade Launcher, manufacturer unknown" _reads an eager pop-up; she dismisses it) -not from an armory or even a secured locker.

Just ...off the floor.

She grins, winces, and grins again -Ash would have lost her damn mind if she found a heavy weapon adrift like a lost sock.

Not registered to an omnitool either, and next to a dead man in a white uniform trimmed in black.

...which features an odd gold hexagonal logo on both shoulders.

* * *

Another door, another hallway, more dead, the whistling tick of Shuriken fire as Christina carves corners and punctures droids.

Breach and clear, breach and clear. Extra heatsinks, spare credits and video logs of a pale brunette clinically discussing her revival from "meat and tubes," no less.

No more than that, either.

Christina shudders, waits a beat for her shield to beep it's restored capacity, cuts the pie with her weapon up and her nerves still vibrating with readiness.

Ahead, a survivor in an adjacent corridor -a woman's face flush with sweat, wet with tears, eyes open in panic, she's beating on the armorglass, pleading for her life.

Christina's looking, glancing around, no threats apparent, no connecting doors -the grind of heavy fire bursts the survivor's torso, turns the cracked glass into a scrambled anatomical study.

Stomp, stomp -a mech. Big one.

_YMIR, mark 2 manufactured by Hahne-Kedar-_

She slides into cover, dismisses the tooltip.

She understands that it's glaring central eye is primarily for intimidation just like it's bulky silhouette and that if it **could** penetrate the armorglass it would already be firing.

Well, it's working -she's wedged her ass down tight under the glass, peering up over in only quick flashes of exposure.

Christina wants to destroy it -for the dead woman (_one of many it's likely killed_, that cold part of her notes) and to secure the area.

Also to locate supplies, secure survivors, aqcuire better weapons (_and to find out where the hell she is_).

But she can't, and she knows that glass isn't why.

Keeping low, she scuttles onward.

* * *

Hello Jacob Taylor, biotic and security head of Lazarus Project.

Jacob's a nice guy; nice fit guy in his snug bodyglove, too (_-and cool under fire_).

Jacob talks about Miranda Lawson, director of Lazarus Project.

Jacob confirms that she has an accent and is a pale-skinned brunette.

Jacob mentions Dr. Wilson, another survivor he's trying to find and a lead researcher of the Lazarus Project.

Jacob doesn't think there are many more survivors on Lazarus Station.

They're taking a breath under fire, and part of Christina Shepard rankles at how foolish that is -one grenade on their position ends this bizarre rebirth of hers, when Jacob (_mentally fortifying himself first_) brings up who's paying the bills:

**Cerberus**.

Jacob is crouching as he biotically yanks the last mech from across the room, is lining up a shot as it floats closer -Shepard slams it with a warp, refuses to take cover as the two biotic effects mutually explosively destabilize and stares squarely at Jacob as they're pelted by smoldering circuitry and cheap mech plating.

He nods in honest acquiescence.

Message received.

She extends her hand, he grasps it and pulls himself up.

* * *

Dr. Wilson, at last.

Dr. Wilson is injured, but not severely.

Dr. Wilson is shifty; he knows what happened, he doesn't know why, and he's not keen to explore why this disaster started in a department he didn't have business in while he was in it.

Shepard is keeping him between herself and Jacob, between point and drag.

Just in case.

More babbling idiot mechs, but Jacob says the shuttle bay is getting close.

Shepard is keeping up the pace, overloading and warping, shooting and moving cover to cover.

A door slides up revealing a broad-faced brunette with a displeased scowl.

Dr. Wilson, meet "Miranda, how-"

*POW*

Dr. Wilson is gone from the septum up -Jacob helpfully tips his merrily fountaining stump away from them.

Shepard has got her gun on Miranda, and Miranda is unimpressed (_and armed with a large sidearm that's clearly not a Predator_).

Short form: Wilson's a traitor, everyone else onboard is either dead or is being left for dead ("they knew the risks" -"_how very Cerberus of you_," Christina mentally shoots back), and frankly she's taking Mr. Jacob Taylor, the former head of security for the soon-to-be-former Lazarus Station, and leaving Shepard if that's what it takes to get out of there.

Christina's pissed, but Miranda's right.

* * *

The shuttle hums through space as they speed away, and Shepard is oddly disappointed that Lazarus Station doesn't explode.

She imagining some last few scientists and workers struggling towards the shuttle bay, wonders if they could sneak past the "YMIR mark 2 manufactured by Hahne-Kedar" and escape.

Or if they'll survive just to starve.

She saw a second shuttle parked in the shuttle bay. _On fire_.

She snorts derisively; Miranda glances up from her omnitool, goes back to typing.

Rachni. Husks. Thresher maw acid. Rear Admiral Kohaku.

Those techs are Cerberus -they're not innocent, they're not harmless, and that yet _another_ of Cerberus's strange experiments resulted in the subject getting loose and the research team getting wiped out is as predictable as gravity.

Shepard has questions, Miranda refuses to provide answers.

Meet "The Illusive Man" ("_TIM_,") and he'll explain everything.

Like why she's back from the dead, and what that gift is going to cost her.

And maybe everyone else.


End file.
